The unprecedented closure of California's courts for one day a month, starting today, will cost nearly 20,000 employees a day's wages - including the state Supreme Court justices and most of their judicial colleagues.

The mandatory furloughs don't apply to the state's 1,700 judges, but Chief Justice Ronald George says all seven state Supreme Court justices and other judges are voluntarily giving up a day's salary.

In his annual State of the Judiciary speech last weekend, George said a "very high percentage" of the judges have agreed either to waive one day's pay per month for the next 10 months or to donate the same amount to their court.

He didn't specify the statewide percentage, but said participation was unanimous on the Supreme Court and some appellate and county superior courts.

George also didn't say how many judges would show up at work on days they weren't getting paid, though he has indicated that he plans to do so.

Larry Goodman, an Alameda County Superior Court judge, said he plans to work today and divide his paycheck among his three staff members.

"They didn't have a choice" to collect their pay, he said. "I certainly have enough work to do, and instead of giving the money to the court, I want to give it to the people I'm directly responsible for."

The state Judicial Council, which George chairs, voted in July to close the courts on the third Wednesday of each month starting in September, a projected savings of $94 million from the judicial budget.

The action was "extreme but necessary," the chief justice said in his weekend speech in San Diego. The closures will delay many court proceedings, including hearings to arrange bail for criminal defendants.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has ordered most state employees to take three days off without pay each month as a cost-cutting measure to help balance the budget, but he has no authority over court employees.

The pay waivers will cost judges 4.6 percent of their salary each month. Their annual salaries are $238,071 for George, $218,237 for his Supreme Court colleagues, $204,599 for the appeals courts and $178,789 for Superior Court.

The response was different in 1991 when then-Chief Justice Malcolm Lucas asked court employees to take a voluntary furlough day in each of four months to avert mandatory cutbacks.

Lucas didn't address his appeal to judges, but Supreme Court Justice Joyce Kennard, alone among 95 justices on the appellate courts and Supreme Court, said she would work four days without pay rather than ask her staff to bear the burden by themselves.